This is Part 1 of a 3-Part Blog Series
You’re all familiar with points - but have you heard of $PIU?
Today we’re unveiling the Pike Points Program - or more accurately, the Pike PIU Program (PPP). This is Blogpost #1, with more on the way in due time.
TLDR:
- The Pike PIU Program (PPP) is Pike’s spin on the typical points program
- Instead of earning points, you’ll earn the $PIU token, which can be claimed at anytime
- This token is claimable and tradable on Base and Solana
- Earn $PIU by:
- Supplying assets
- Borrowing assets
- Earning Roles within the Pike Discord community
- Users can freely trade $PIU on the open market, and buying $PIU will give you the same benefits as if you were to earn it
- Holding this token qualifies you for certain exclusive benefits such as being whitelisted for Pike’s upcoming public sale of $PIKE, among other things
- The more $PIU you earn/hold, the larger your allocation and rewards
- Don’t forget to Pike It Up!
So what is the Pike PIU Program (PPP)?
The Pike PIU Program is Pike’s answer to contemporary points campaigns. Designed for the community.
Rather than earning points which are merely pixels on a screen for an indefinite period of time with the hope of an airdrop down the line, if you take part in the PPP, you’ll instead earn the $PIU token.
$PIU is a natively multichain token, and is able to be claimed on both Base and Solana (and can be easily transferred back and forth via Wormhole). The price of $PIU will be determined by the market and is only minted/emitted when earned through the PPP.
You can earn $PIU within the PPP like you typically earn points in other programs, by engaging within the Pike dApp on-chain:
- By supplying USDC, ETH, OP or ARB
- By borrowing assets across Ethereum, Base, Optimism or Arbitrum
- Holding these positions over time
However, you can also earn $PIU by having roles within the Pike Discord and being a meaningful member of the community. Specific $PIU allocations will be revealed in Part 2 of this blogpost series. To read about the roles in more detail, check out:
We are aware that a large percentage of people who spend time within DeFi aren’t the most capitalized - whether it be simply due to financial position, or if you come from a country with a weak currency or economy, and we find it disappointing that they’re effectively excluded from most points campaigns simply because teams value TVL and volume above all else.
As we’ve learned from our amazing community, lots of people want to take part in the social aspect of a project, either because they’re inexperienced within DeFi, or they simply don’t have sufficient funds for it to be meaningful. These people are the lifeblood of Pike and we will not ignore or minimize how much they mean to us, and hence if you’ve been extremely active within Discord and earned any of the special roles available - you should be rewarded too.
And finally, to be clear, Airdrop Farmers are often considered to be “parasitic” or “e-beggars” by other teams - we share a different view. These are potential users and community members, and as a result, we want to support and elevate them just like we would with any other individual. Rather than disqualifying them, we instead want to make sure we design Pike and the PPP to align with everyone’s interests because again, it’s the community that allows us to achieve anything, let alone our long term vision.
However, we value fairness above all else and want to make sure the playing field is equitable and even. The only way to guarantee $PIU and other rewards is once you earn a role - keep it.
Do not try to game the system - you will slip through the cracks.
Why even build the PPP?
Very simply, the PPP is Pike’s unique take on a traditional points program - which are typically focused on incentivizing on-chain actions by implying the user will receive an airdrop for all the time, money and effort they’ve invested.
Protocols like Blur and Swell Network have showcased how effective these campaigns have been, and now it seems every team has or is either thinking about implementing a points program - however most of them are inherently flawed.
Too often, points campaigns are launched with zero clarity about what the user should expect from it, and the assumption is that people will want to take part so they receive an airdrop in the future. While certain initiatives (especially a token launch) are constantly in flux, this is quite opaque and people can be farming a points program for months on end with no indication if it’s even worth the effort, let alone the gas fees.
This has led to disdain towards points programs and members of the Pike team are no exception. We believe that the journey of any DeFi project is firmly in the hands of the team and the community - there is no competition, only collaboration. As such, transparency is paramount and we want our friends within the community to be in the know, rather than hoping the team has their best interest at heart. Don’t trust, verify.
With this being said, we understand speculation is a part of the game - both in terms of generating momentum and awareness, but also just having fun. But rather than users speculate on how big an airdrop will be, or how much ROI a pre-sale event will lead to (which will happen anyway of course), we are implementing a mechanism that allows people to speculate in a truly DeFi-native way, with the launch of the $PIU token, and what the PPP itself is centered around.
Not to mention, $PIKE won’t be available immediately however for individuals who want to join us on the journey of Pike becoming the standard for both lending and multichain applications - $PIU is how you can be a part immediately.
As a matter of fact, even after 14 months of building Pike, we have chosen not to raise any funds from institutional investors.  Instead, we will be organizing a public sale - making it entirely community driven in every way possible. $PIU is how you can secure a whitelist to $PIKE public sale, as well as increasing the size of your allocation depending on what tier of $PIU holder you become through engaging with the PPP. Details on $PIKE public sale will be revealed in Part 3 of this blogpost series.
What about the $PIU token?
The team has been thinking about how to design the protocol governance token - $PIKE, both in terms of utility, and as a token itself. Something that is not negotiable is $PIKE should be an inherently multichain token, much like how the protocol itself is - and doesn’t have to be wrapped when transferred between chains and ecosystems alike.
How can we do this? Simple - Wormhole and by utilizing Native Token Transfers (NTT). This new framework will allow native transfers between chains without needing complicated liquidity pools and wrapped/bridged versions of assets.
But with all things, especially those of high importance, we have to take things slow to ensure security, functionality and UX.
As a result, $PIU serves as a beta-testing ground in a real and active environment for launching a natively multichain token, before we do the same for Pike’s dedicated protocol/governance token.
$PIU will only be emitted from the PPP, and also have an infinite supply, with it being minted when users carry out tasks within the dApp and claim allocations from having Discord roles. Furthermore, it will be able to be claimed on the Base L2, as well as Solana (with liquidity pools on both networks) - echoing Pike’s vision of connecting EVM and non-EVM ecosystems into a single liquidity layer.
What now?
Our timeline for the launch of the PIU system will be early to mid March 2024.
We encourage you to join our Discord and interact with the protocol to set yourself up for rewards.
All actions on Pike will qualify you for PIU, so continue to borrow and supply through Pike, or use your Pike deposits to farm other programs simultaneously!
In addition, be sure to follow Pike on Twitter for the latest updates and all announcements!
PIKE IT UP!
About Pike:
Pike is a Universal Liquidity Protocol; it is designed to unleash utility for native assets by aggregating liquidity across blockchain networks.
Pike’s vision is to become a universal liquidity layer that enables frictionless movement and accessibility of native assets across ecosystems. Pike is built on top of Wormhole’s Cross-Chain Data Messaging and Circle’s Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol (CCTP), and utilizes Pyth Network’s Price Feeds.
One fundamental primitive of Pike is to enable users to supply native assets on source chains and borrow native assets destination chains without interacting with cross-chain bridges and handling wrapped assets.
Learn more at:Â https://www.pike.finance/
Join the Discord at:Â https://discord.gg/pikefinance